Three Claude Certs in One Month
Three Anthropic exams. About a month. All passed.
The first took me two to three weeks. The second took five days. The last took two.
First, a fact many people miss: you can’t sign up as an individual. The exams are only open to people connected to a company in the Claude Partner Network. I partner with one, Neo Analog Lab, a Tokyo AI consultancy that also runs Claude training. That’s how I got access.
The cost was still mine. I paid for all three myself, $425 in total.
Notice the last row. The Professional exam costs the most.
There’s a fourth cert: Claude Certified Associate - Foundations (CCAO-F), $99. I skipped it. It isn’t technical, and for my own money it wouldn’t add much. (Is it useless? No. It’s a decent way to learn Claude’s product lines and the features built for business users.)
This post covers what each exam felt like, which order to take them in, and the prep loop that worked for all three.
Why the Prep Time Kept Dropping
Two to three weeks. Then five days. Then two.
Did I get lazy? No. I adjusted.
CCAF came first, so it carried the load. Everything was new, and much of what I learned for it came back in the other two.
For CCDV-F, Reddit said it was the easiest of the three. I didn’t take that on faith. I did a mock exam first, and the questions really were simpler. So I cut my prep to five days.
CCAR-P was harder to call. Some people said it was tough. Others said it was easy. Who do you believe? I read the official course, trusted my long enterprise experience, and went for it.
Honestly? Two days was a bit risky. The clock nearly beat me.
Other people’s stories set your starting point. A mock exam tells you where you really are.
CCAF: The Long Read
Claude Certified Architect - Foundations. Passed 14 September 2026, 857/1000.
60 questions. I needed 1 hour 31 minutes.
The reading is the hard part. The multi-agent questions came first, and they were long. More than once I had to stop and reset because my brain was tired from parsing nuance. (Don’t panic at the start. The questions got shorter later, at least in my exam.)
Full prep notes are in my CCAF article on LinkedIn.
CCDV-F: The Easy One
Claude Certified Developer - Foundations. Passed 19 September 2026, 926/1000.
Much easier than CCAF. Shorter questions. Less complexity.
What helped most were the labs. Reading about an API is one thing. Seeing the code is another. Developers are supposed to talk in code, aren’t they?
Passed CCAF with a solid score? Then CCDV-F should be fine.
CCAR-P: The Newest One
I passed the Claude Certified Architect - Professional (CCAR-P) exam on 21 September 2026 with 860/1000. Two days after CCDV-F.
How I Prepared
Two days, about 4 hours a day.
I read the official course: five modules, lots of text. No paid drills this time. For practice, I did one full timed mock and a few short ones on claudearchitectguide.com.
What Surprised Me
The question types change. It’s not all “pick one” anymore. Some questions are yes/no. Some want two answers, not one. Read the instructions on every question.
The reading is heavy again. Just like CCAF. Add the new question types, and the two hours nearly ran out. I finished my review with 12 minutes left.
This exam tests your reading. It also tests how you handle time pressure.
Then there’s the enterprise jargon. All of it comes from the five official modules, so read them. (Will it stick? Not all of it. It’s a lot of text to absorb in a few days.)
Here’s what saved me. I’ve worked in enterprise environments for years, so I could guess many terms from context. The rest is common sense if you’ve worked in a big corporate. Never worked in one? Give the modules more time than I did.
I felt less sharp than I did for CCAF. I still passed. For me, CCAR-P sits between the other two: easier than CCAF, harder than CCDV-F.
“Professional” doesn’t mean hardest.
Which Order?
My difficulty ranking: CCAF, then CCAR-P, then CCDV-F.
My advice on order: take them the way I did. CCAF, then CCDV-F, then CCAR-P.
Why start with the hardest? Because it’s the foundation. CCAF covers the most ground, and the other two build on it. CCDV-F then comes cheap, since most of what it asks you already know. CCAR-P goes last, when you have the full picture and can focus on the enterprise side.
The Prep Loop I Used for All Three
Three exams. Three different topics. One loop.
1. Search Two Ways
Search the exam title on Google. Then search it again with “reddit” on the end.
The first search finds the official page and the study sites. The second finds people who just sat the exam. Their posts are recent, and the comments underneath are often better than the post.
2. Bookmark What Helps
Save everything that looks useful: the official exam page, Reddit threads, practice exams, study repos.
Don’t judge yet. Just collect.
3. Filter Out the Slop
Now go through the bookmarks quickly. Some are gold. Many are AI-generated pages that repeat the exam guide in longer words.
How do you tell? The good ones have specifics: real question styles, real mistakes, real scores. Keep those. Delete the rest.
Start with the official source. It tells you the exam sections and what Anthropic expects you to study. Everything else fills the gaps.
4. Study the Official Material
Read what Anthropic publishes first. Then pick a study method that fits the exam.
- CCAF: I built a Claude Code study template that pulls the official content and turns it into questions and labs.
- CCDV-F: I did the labs. Seeing the code made the developer questions click.
- CCAR-P: Just the official course, five modules. It was enough.
Different exam, different tool. The step stays the same.
5. Drill
Do the mock exams from your bookmarks. Add a paid drill set if you want more volume (I used one for CCAF and CCDV-F).
For CCAR-P, I skipped paid drills. I did one full timed mock and a few short ones on claudearchitectguide.com. It’s free, needs no sign-up, and covers all three exams. I found it too late. If I started over, I’d use it for all three.
Reading feels like progress. Drills show you whether it is.
6. Screenshot Every Miss, Ask Claude
Every question you get wrong, screenshot it. Send the screenshot to Claude and ask it to check the answer.
Why? Some practice questions have the wrong answer. You need to know which ones. And when the answer is right, Claude explains why, and the why is what sticks.
Those screenshots become your flashcards.
7. Gate at 80%
Keep drilling until your score stays above 80%. Then go back through your screenshots of missed questions.
If the misses now look obvious, you’re ready. If they don’t, drill more.
8. Book the Exam
Only now. Not before.
(Won’t the slots be gone? Not for the online exam. You take it at home, and free slots were always there when I looked.)
Exam Day: Check Your Setup Early
All three exams are online, from home, with a live proctor. Sort out the logistics days ahead, not on the morning.
- Computer: Windows or macOS only. Linux isn’t supported.
- Hardware: webcam, microphone, and speaker.
- System test: run it at least one day before.
- Phone: keep it at hand. You’ll use it to take a selfie, photograph your ID, and show your room.
- Arrival: join 30 minutes early.
Nothing here is hard. It’s just annoying to discover on exam day.
Was It Worth It?
Yes. But know what you’re buying.
Before the exams, my Claude knowledge was a pile of separate pieces. Preparing for all three forced me to connect them. Now I see the big picture.
What the certs don’t give you is hands-on experience. Passing an exam about agents is not the same as building one. (Can the prep help? Sure. But you still have to write the code and ship it.)
The certs map the territory. Building is how you learn to walk it.
Wrap Up
Three exams. About a month. One loop that worked every time: search, filter, study, drill, check your misses with Claude, and go when you’re ready.
For CCAF and CCDV-F, I also bought paid mock exams. They’re not real exam questions. But they helped me check what I knew and find the gaps I hadn’t prepared for. If you’re interested, send me a DM on LinkedIn or email me at tdxiaoxi2@gmail.com.
Which cert are you going for first?